Moving from a Blog to a Website

When I started making money through my blog I decided it was time to upgrade. I had been using a free blog hosted on a well-known site for about a year. The blog did what I wanted it to; it drew attention to my skills and helped me to find work. I found it was a great starting point but as I progressed in my own self-made career I needed to become more professional and move on to the next level.

Lack of Web Design Skills Held Me Back

As I have very little skills in web design I was rather nervous about the prospect of moving onto a website. I think that’s why I help off for so long. However, I really had to just bite the bullet, get myself a proper domain, a work email and make myself appear as professional as the services I was providing.  I needed to be able to find a way of making a site that I could manage myself without too much difficulty.
To start with I looked at training in coding; I even attended a course on how to create your own website through distance learning. I found this a struggle and coding was a real issue for me, so I simply gave up. Not only was it difficult to grasp I found I was very pushed for time trying to run my business and my home as well as finding time to complete the course. I began looking at other options and thankfully I found one that has worked out excellently.

Outsourcing was a Positive Move

I had the site created for me. I hired someone to create the site itself, telling them what I needed with a big emphasis on the blog section. This is how I show off my skills and expertise and also help to build trust in my potential clients. It’s how my business took off so I needed to be able to add and edit blog posts quickly and simply just like before. The only difference being the site surrounding my posts and the domain.  I had some amazing graphics created too which really helped to improve the overall look and start to develop my own ‘brand’.  I used the image as the profile pictures on social networking sites I use for marketing and very quickly I grew from a blogger to a fully fledge business woman.

Easy to Manage and Add Content as and When I Need

The site I had created for me came with a really easy to use management system. It’s amazing to think that someone like me is able to manage their own website without any formal skills. I am able to go in at any time and make any changes I need. I took the time to learn while playing around on the site, and very quickly I began to understand how things worked. I focused on placing content on my home page and the about page and created a friendly contact page so any traffic knew how to get hold of me if I could convince them to make some enquiries.
The blog itself is pretty easy to manage too. I have a blogging schedule which I stick to and it involves creating the piece, adding it to the site and publishing or scheduling for a later date. I am still able to add images and photos and format the piece as I could on my previous blogging site. I feel so happy with the result and now I am managing to secure more clients I know it was a really great step to take.

There is no need to be a trained website designer to manage a website. Using content management systems makes working on a website so much simpler.